The Wedding Crashers
by Lorelei Rhetorical
Summary: There will be Fax. After Itex. The flock is in NY. They've taken up crashing weddings. Where are the erasers? Why haven't they attacked? Find out.
1. The Wedding Crashers

It's been about three months since the thing with Itex. We'd blown out of Florida the second the erasers came after us, and flew back to New York. Since then, they really haven't bothered us much at all. We've taken up wedding crashing, and a lot has changed. Iggy has become quite the stud. At almost every wedding we crash, he finds a girl. It's pretty amusing, actually, watching him, "work his magic", as he would say. Nudge has grown so much in the past few months, you'd think she's some sort of mutant. Oh, right. Anyway, moving on. Angel's beautiful curls almost completely straightened out into beautiful, straight golden locks. We've been staying at a hotel in New York, courtesy of my Maximum Ride credit card. It's a pretty nice one, actually. We're in upstate New York, away from the freaks in the city. There's one restaurant that we always go to for weddings. It's a very popular restaurant; a lot of couples use it. We find a wedding there nearly every day. It's in Saratoga, but it's only about a five minute flight.

Okay, now that you're pretty much caught up, let's continue.

I was sitting in the hotel room that I shared with Fang. I was waiting for the rest of the flock to get ready, to crash a wedding. Fang sat next to me, and we kissed. Which was fine, we'd been doing a lot of that lately. Did I forget to mention that we were together? Whoops, Sorry.

It was a quick kiss, but that was okay, because that's when my flock came in, and, being the overprotective leader that I am, I try to shield them from such things. But they don't mind. I mean, me shielding them, they aren't use to…_us _any way. It had been two months since we'd started dating, but for some reason, the rest of the flock still shudders to think.

"Ready?" I asked, standing up, and dragging Fang up with me, by his hand.

"Yup." The flock said, almost in unison. I led them out the door, and around to the alley, behind the hotel, where we took off. Mr. and newly Mrs. Rodriguez, here we come.


	2. Long Night

Fang was bored of his skull at the Rodriguez wedding. It was pouring down rain, and it was **freezing**. This reception had been an outdoor function, but luckily, there was just enough cover for everyone to stay mostly dry. Max was mingling, Iggy was flirting with some girl, Nudge and Angel were arguing over which waiter was cuter, and Gazzy was…wait. Where's Gazzy? _Crap. _He thought.

"Max." Fang said, trying to get her attention. She was talking to some woman about something, he wasn't really paying attention. It didn't look like she was either, but she looked determined to look like she was listening.

"Max, it's G…Zephyr." He said, hooking his arm around her waist, and turning her around with him. He looked back at the woman.

"Sorry, it's kind of important." She gave him a nod, saying that she understood.

"Where's Gazzy?" Max asked Fang.

"I don't know. But I'm guessing that he's either building a bomb, placing a bomb, or being kidnapped." Fang answered.

"Sucky choices." Max replied.

That's when they heard the shriek of terror.

"I know that scream." Max said. Fang knew it too.

"Erasers must be here." She continued.

"And they have Gazzy." Fang finished.

This was going to be a long night.


	3. In Your Head

**Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. I've been swamped with homework, and studying for exams, and such. I'll update as soon as I can.**

Chapter 3

I gathered up my flock, and we headed through the outdoor tunnels, that were still covered in fresh rain. Probably because it was still raining, but I digress. There were doors, and turns all around us, and we really did know where to check_. We have to split up. _I thought. It seemed to be the only way to thoroughly check _everywhere_.

"No. We can't split up. Something bad happens every time we split up." Angel. She read my mind. That was one sly little six year old. Well, seven year old. Her birthday was yesterday. As a present, we were making the transition from three hotel rooms, to one apartment. It had four bedrooms, and it was going still going to max out the Max card.

"I understand how you feel, sweetie, but if we don't, we'll never find them in time. We might take the time to check everywhere together, only to find that they're not here anymore." I said, trying to reason with her. But if she used her mind control on me, resistance would be futile.

"No, they're still here. Or, at least, Gazzy is. I hear his thoughts, but no erasers. His thoughts are coming from…over there." She said. She seemed to be in somewhat of a trance, and she held her arm out, pointing to the left, around a corner. I led the way down the hall, still getting soaked from the hurricane-worthy rain. As a matter of fact, it wasn't just rain, there was also fierce wind. **(A.N.I'm Tyra!)**

"He doesn't know where he is. He can see. He's outside, but surrounded by walls. On one wall, there's a door. He doesn't want to get up. His ankle hurts, but he doesn't think it's broken. Sprained, maybe. He gets up, and walks to the door." Angel said, telling us Gazzy's thoughts. I was starting to think this was way weird. Why would the erasers just leave him here with a sprained ankle? Just then, I heard a noise. A muffled cry. Gazzy.

"Gazzy! Stay where you are! Is the door locked?" I yelled, hoping he heard me.

"Max? Where are you? Uh, yeah, it's locked. I think I sprained my ankle." Gazzy yelled. He was obviously shocked to hear from us, his voice was pretty high.

"We're gonna kick the door in, hold on!" I cried, making my way to the door that he was behind. The flock followed. I let Fang take this one, he was the strongest of us, and this door looked pretty tough. Just as he was making his way to the front of our mini-crowd, we were jump by nearly one hundred erasers. _I knew it had to be a trap! _I knew where they were taking us; the Institute. The headquarters for failed experiments.


	4. Failed Experiments

Failed experiments. That's all we were now. So they were taking us to the Institute. They were probably going to experiment on us, until our internal organs were sitting next to us in our dog crates. Like those other poor souls that we saw when we went there. They no doubt knew it was us. How could they not? They probably figured it out when they checked out the printed file on the computer that we used. They probably saw what we printed and said, 'Oh, that damned flock. We have to remove their livers now.' Because that's just our luck.

Do you know what one hundred divided by six is? Sixteen point six repeating. That's right. There were about sixteen erasers on each of us. We had about four on us, than about twelve back-up erasers, incase we decided to try anything. So, sixteen multiplied by six is ninety-six, and the other four-ish were on watch, making sure none of the wedding guests saw any of us.

They were actually _carrying_ us through the labyrinth-like halls. I guess they really didn't want us to try to run. They meant business this time. Too bad we did too. As soon as there was enough room, I was gone. They had a very loose grip on me. I knew it was _supposed_ to be a death grip, but it was the worst one I've ever felt. The erasers finally found their way out of there, and I flew away. One of the erasers that had been holding me tightened his grip on my ankle. The rest of the flock was already several feet above me. As soon as they'd seen me move, they'd done the same. I use my super-speed, and was out of there in an instant. The flock followed me, and we went far above the flight limit thingy for helicopters. About this time, I realized that my eraser had hung strong.

"Fang." He looked over at me, and smiled slightly. "Could you help me get rid of him?"

He did. He punched him. Hard. In the head. And then he fell. Far. He fell into the lake below us with a loud, 'splash', and a pretty splash pattern in the water. We flew back to our hotel rooms. We were almost positive that they didn't know where we lived. We started to pack, to move to our new apartment. Not that there was much to pack. We all had two outfits. One casual and one formal. We used that one to crash weddings.

No one said anything the whole time we packed, the whole time we flew, the whole time we unpacked. Not even Nudge. I was freaked. But I dismissed it. I was exhausted. I didn't have the energy to deal with this right now. I went to my room. Well, our room. Fang, and I shared it. Shocker, huh? I fell asleep before my head hit the pillow. Home, sweet home.


	5. Good Day

**I'm sorry that my chapters are so short. In word, they look a lot longer.**

**You know, I actually have to reread my story every time I start a new chapter, so that I don't screw up the story line. I read too many fan fictions. Anyway, before I write another chapter, I want 25 reviews. You can review as many times as you want, they all count.**

When I woke up, I was definitely warmer than I had been when I'd fallen asleep. Of course, I knew exactly why. Fang. Our room had a king sized bed, and we were in the middle of it. I was lying there, wrapped in Fang's arms, all cozy, and warm. It felt great. But now I had to figure out what was up with those erasers. They were obviously trying to trick us. But it wasn't going to work. They were, after all, terrible actors. They obviously wanted to make us believe that they were determined to bring us back to the Institute, when, in fact, they did not. But why? This was going to take some thought. I started to sit up, and carefully untangle myself from Fang's arms. I knew it would wake him up, but that was alright. We all needed to get up. It was past ten!

I heard him groan a little, when I'd finally escaped his death-grip. He sat up, and gave me a look that said. 'Five more minutes, mommy.' Which I found amusing.

"No. We have to get up. Will you get Iggy, and Gazzy? I'll get the girls." He yawned, but got up, and once he'd stood up, he looked totally alert, and awake. How did he do that? He walked out the door, and down the hall. I did the same. I walked to the girls' room, and opened the door quietly. But they were already up. Weird.

"Why are you guys up already?" I asked, interested in what they would say.

"I'll tell you later." Angel said, looking at me intently. It was almost as if she was trying to figure out how I felt. Like she couldn't read my mind.

I bet you're wondering why I haven't mentioned Total, huh? Well, don't worry; he's still alive, and well. He didn't kick the bucket, or anything. He sleeps right next to Angel every night. Kind of cute, actually.

When I walked out of the girls' room, I saw Fang emerging from Gazzy's room, closing the door behind him.

"Iggy's in the kitchen." He said, looking at me. He must have seen how weirded out I was, by the thing with Angel, and Nudge, 'cause he quirked one eyebrow, and said, "What's got you so freaked?" It was weird, how, suddenly, he could read my mind better than the actual mind reader.

"Nothing. Just, something with the girls." I said, then I went to the kitchen, to order my breakfast.

"What's on the menu?" I asked Iggy, who was feeling along the top shelf of the fridge.

"Well, it feels like the fridge came fully stocked. What do you want?"

"Bacon sounds good. With hash browns." I got up to check the freezer for those things.

When I got to the fridge, I gently guided Iggy away from it.

"We're in luck!" I said, pulling out the ingredients to my custom breakfast. Iggy turned on the stove to start breakfast.

It was going to be a good day.

Or so I thought.

**Remember, if you expect another chapter, review, review, review!**


	6. A Day of Rest

**Author's note: I'm a bad author, a bad person! It's been two _years _ since I updated this thing. For the record, it's been bugging me a lot. And I intend to finish this—although it could take a while, because AP World History takes up all of my time. But, eventually it'll happen. Let's just hope it doesn't take another two years. Oh, by the way, I'm going to try really hard to remember where I was going with Angel and Nudge already being awake, and the weird thing with Angel, and whatnot, but I can't guarantee I'll be able to. It's been two years. I'm sorry. D:**

Crashing weddings is a good source of free food. Plus, I may tend to be a bit of a tomboy, but secretly, my girlish side loves to wear a pretty dress. The whole flock enjoys it, really, despite the fact that everyone resisted at first.

However, today, we have decided to take a break. We can't go back to our old crashing grounds, obviously, and everyone's still a bit shook up from yesterday. So today, we rest. Tomorrow, we search. Because after tomorrow, we'll probably run out of food.

Over breakfast, Fang asks what the plan for today is.

For the record, I did not have sex with Fang. I'm young, but I'm not stupid. I'm not saying I'm going to wait until marriage, but I _am _going to wait until I'm good and ready, and I'm not, yet.

I tell him I have no idea. I explain that I have no intention of crashing a wedding today, and everyone looks relieved—even Fang. Then I tell them I think we should reserve tomorrow to find a new place go, and Gazzy looks a little worried.

"It's okay, man. We'll find a new place; far, far away from the old." That doesn't seem to help him one bit, but he says a soft, "Okay," and finishes his breakfast.

"Let's go apple picking." Angel says.

I shoot her a look that says 'Do you remember the last time you wanted to go pick some fruit?'

She giggled at me and said there was an orchard a few minutes away—you pay to pick, and they make cider from the apples you pick.

"Alright, surrounded by other people picking apples, making juices--"

"And donuts,"

"And donuts, we should be safe there. How much cash do we have left?"

"Thirty dollars," Fang says, counting the money from the drawer.

"That should get us all in," I say, "Let's go."

And we're off.


	7. To The Orchard

**Author's Note: No one seems to be reading anymore (which I can understand), but I'm going to keep writing it anyway, because I know that if I don't, it'll just gnaw at me forever.**

As it turns out, when Angel says 'a few minutes,' she really means two hours. Now, I don't mind a two hour flight. I _like _to fly. I just don't want Angel to tell me it's only a few minutes away when it's really not.

So there we were, flying through the sky (obviously, where else would we fly?), me shooting Angel discreet 'how could you' looks, Fang chuckling at me and my looks, Angel pretending not to notice, and Gazzy, Iggy, and Nudge genuinely not noticing, when my head starts to hurt. _Hello, Maximum._

For a moment, I forgot how to fly.

Between the millisecond that my eyes closed to the millisecond that they reopened, I had dropped several hundred feet. I don't know how, and I don't know _when_, since I never felt the sensation of falling, or not falling for that matter, but Fang managed to catch me.

At this point, the Flock is concerned.

We are now just hovering, stationary in the sky, and I'm looking from concerned face to concerned face, trying to smile like everything's okay. But it's not okay. The voice is back, the retched voice, and I don't know what to make of that.

The voice has left me alone for so long, I had allowed myself the think it might never come back.

Even in my post-voice trance, I could tell from their faces that they knew what was happening. But, bless them; none of them said a word. Iggy was the first to pick up on the uncomfortable 'oh, crap, it's back' silence, and he was the first to break it.

"…Are we ready to keep going?"

Fang was hesitant.

"Can you fly?"

"Yeah, I think so…This one wasn't nearly as bad as it usually is."

"Is that why you fell out of the sky?"

I gave him a grimace and hopped out of his arms to prove that I could indeed fly, although, not as well I usually could. When I jumped away from him, I staggered a bit, and hesitated, so I almost fell again, but I managed to catch myself and stay up. He didn't look pleased.

"Come on, gang. We're off to the orchard," I said, and continued flying toward where Angel had said the Orchard was.

"Are you sure you're okay?" said a concerned Angel.

"Should we go back?" a concerned Nudge.

"I'll be _fine_." They didn't look convinced, but the Flock followed nonetheless.

_Maximum, you shouldn't go to the orchard._

_Since when do I listen to you?_ I thought bitterly at the voice.

_Be careful, Maximum._


End file.
